Recent content by macaler

Well.. Life happens and things fall by the way-side, including my cider. TODAY, i made the decision.. do-or-die. Finish off my product. My 1 gallon batch (experimental) with the cinnamon sticks, looked like it was beginning to be infected. Not too bad, but there to see. It had a lovely...

Well... Threw it all in secondary tonight.. Just to get off the lees while I decide what to sweeten with. I did have a gallon I made seperate, I just threw in some cinnamon sticks in that as a test. It came out to approx. 7.5%. Not a bad number.. it was sitting exactly at 1.000 SG from an OG...

No Idea.. BUT I like the idea of using Honey vice sugar in primary! How has this worked out for you (or is this the first time?). I may actually back-sweeten with honey now that I think about it! ??

Ive never heard of using Campden tabs before back sweetening and bottling.. Is this something that people do? I personally do the "Hot water" method to kill the yeast once I'm where I want to be IRT carbonation, after back-sweetening.

I tried to be fancy and go for carbonation in the bottle. Misjudged and had some serious bottle bombs. Salvaged some but the taste was quiet sour.

I started my 3rd batch yesterday. Threw some caution to the wind as i really just " did it". My second batch was an example of me being over zealous and trying too much too quick and basically making a batch of crap tasting rocket fuel. i sterilized as usual, mixed up my apple juice (store...

Well, i let this mixture sit for a few weeks for no other reason that i was busy. Final SG was .9 .. i guess somewhere around 8-9%. Made 2 separate secondaries with original 6 gallon batch. One I back-sweetened with Grape and the other with pomegranate. Both taste nice. let them sit...

what is in the middle jar?

Phug- thanks for sharing this process. My last/and first batch was back-sweetened with concentrated berry juice. I was pleasantly surprised on the results. seeing this thread has given me the idea to back-sweeten with crushed berries. this may provide more flavour than canned concentrate...

5.5 gallons of various apple juices, mixed in with some local sugar (boiled up some juice to dissolve the hard sugar). Mixed in some yeast nutrient and pitched yeast (it was some cider yeast i bought in USA in a few months ago). OG 1.05 This was last tuesday. Noticed on Saturday that...

How would you know if your yeast is healthy??

Has anyone tried to start another batch of cider with it? Thoughts on that?? In Theory, you could get a few Batches out of one packet of yeast.. right??

i had finished drinking half of my first batch by 5 weeks, which was only in Feb/March. My cider didn't start really bubbling until day 3 either. Started out about 1.05 and ended up about .9.. My batch I mixed up last night is already smashing the airlock to pieces!!

So, did you ever add the enzyme? Any results? For anyone else, whats the opinion on gelatin? what is better to clear?

I keep going around on this in my head. So, lets say i start off with an OG reading of 1.05 on a 5gallon batch, drop my yeast and end up with a FG of 1.00 ... my ABV = 6.5% As this is very dry and unsweet brew, I want to rack off to secondary and back-sweeten. I like to leave my brew...